1. Field of the Invention
The present invention concerns a slide-on type stackable, nestable, multi-level bread tray or basket (the terms tray and basket are interchangeably used herein) especially used for storing baked goods, such as cake, buns, and bread loaves therein. The slide-on, multi-level inventive baskets or trays hereof are advantageously configured to receive and support a second, complimentarily configured tray thereon in either stacked or nested manner, and also allow the stacking of a basket with smaller, overall dimensions.
2. Related Art
It is well known in the operation of bakeries to provide a rigid supporting container in the form of a tray or basket to protect baked goods from damage incident to handling, transport and storage thereof. In most recent years, bakeries have produced a variety of different baked goods, such as loaves, cakes, and hamburger buns. Each of these products is conventionally produced in different product heights, resulting in the need to economically protect all such goods while avoiding the necessity of having different trays or baskets for each product.
As a result, there have been developed a number of different multi-level, stacking trays or baskets which are advantageously designed to stack or nest at different levels according to the height of the product contained therein. For example, a second tray could be superposed over a first tray at a first, lower level for hamburger buns, and at a second, upper level for loaves of bread. Examples of different stacking trays include those shown in the following U.S. Pat. No. 3,387,740 to Bockenstette; U.S. Pat. No. 4,093,070 to Stahl; U.S. Pat. No. 4,106,623 to Carroll et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 4,211,327 to Stahl et al.; U.S. Pat. No. 4,600,103 to Tabler; and U.S. Pat. No. 4,759,451 to Apps.
A difficulty inherent in prior known baskets has been their inability to nest or stack at alternate levels without aligning the upper basket directly over the lower basket. Those problems have largely been overcome by the slide-on, multi-level basket of prior application Ser. No. 07/950,005, filed Sept. 24, 1992 and entitled Slide On Multi-Level Basket, the contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference. The Slide On Multi-Level Basket of said application enables a second basket to slide on to the first basket before dropping into either of its stack or nest positions.
However, a limitation inherent in existing slide-on, multilevel baskets is the requirement that only baskets of similar configuration and overall dimensions can be stacked or nested. Whereas in actual practice, there is a frequent need to stack a basket of smaller overall dimensions on top of one of a larger slide-on, multi,level basket; thus, an object of the present invention is to provide a solution to this need.